Thursday, January 28, 2016

Answerables the innovative educational tool that combines the best features of game based learning w/ a learning management system has just released their free iPad app. Answerables is being used by educators in a variety of ways from collaborating w/ other classes, to browsing the web, all in a secure 3D virtual environment.

Zodlr is a new mobile learning platform that comes in two Zodlr Zig or Zodlr Zag. Zig is the personal learning platform where a student subscribes to one of their learning streams and selects what topic they want to learn about (i.e. Math, Geography, Sports, etc.). Once a topic is subscribed to and the feed is populated w/ information, a user can start to study in one of three ways: notes, multiple choice, or flash cards.

Zodlr Zag is the fully customizable version where a user can personalize their learning experience by determining how many lessons to study each day on a given topic. A user can even differentiate instruction for topics they need help in.

Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Otus the excellent and easy to use Learning Management System for schools has a sleek new design, that allows for easier functionality, a brighter customizable color interface, and real-time analytics and third party integration (i.e. Khan Academy), and of course Otus Worksheets.

Real-Time Analytics: A comprehensive analytics dashboard integrates a wide range of performance indicators into one place, including content from select third-party apps like Khan Academy. Teachers can link data to Common Core State Standards or integrate their own custom standards to report on. Otus tracks a variety of data like attendance, participation, student blogs, assessments and grades. In addition, teachers can also create and track meaningful behaviors like grit, leadership and staying on task through Otus ‘Recognitions’. Because Otus logs all student activity in real-time, teachers can quickly gauge their impact on student growth and provide timely, constructive feedback.

Toolbox: Otus functions as an open, interoperable educational ecosystem allowing teachers to integrate and quickly access the third party apps and content that they use everyday in their classroom. Any Otus user can access free third-party apps or content. If third-party apps and content require a subscription, the subscriber must simply link their account to Otus and they will never have to sign-in to access it again.

Colorful Work Environments: Now teachers and students can choose from a variety of theme and background color options to create a more personalized, vibrant work environment.

Monday, January 25, 2016

Chronicle is an amazing iPad app that helps educators harness and organize their best teaching methodologies. This is done by "chronicling" a students' data and using it in a beneficial and meaningful way. Chronicle is an all-in-one tool that teachers are using for classroom management, grading, assessing, and so much more.

Here are some of Chronicle's features...

1. Ideal for Reading and Writing Workshop conferring notes, but great for any subject

Prodigy is a fantastic free online Math game that is ideal for Game Based Learning. This super fun highly engaging game designed for grades 1st-8th and is aligned to Common Core Standards. Best of all is the teacher portal which allows for educators to assess students and get instant real-time reporting. Prodigy, even has a unique learning engine which allows the game to differentiate instruction and help students w/ areas they are struggling in. Teachers can modify the game to suit their needs and select which skills their students need to focus on too. Also, Prodigy is browser based and works on any device (i.e iPad or Chromebook).

*Prodigy is now for 7th-8th grade too!!!** Prodigy has added thousands of questions covering more than 150 new Math skills!!

Sketch Nation is a wonderful free app (iOS/Android) and website for creating games. Sketch Nation reminds me of Pixel Press Floors but w/out the paper. All a student has to do is select their category of game (i.e. platform, jumping, etc) then draw their backgrounds/characters/items and let Sketch Nation do the rest. The advanced level editor will help students create more complex games and work on their STEM skills. Sketch Nation even has a nice section for education w/ a collection of games created by students.

Soundtrap is a wonderful collaborative learning tool for making podcasts and music that I just found out about from Richard Byrne's excellent blog. Soundtrap is an easy to use site that works on any mobile device to record instruments to create music. However, a student can also use one of Soundtrap's instruments and begin to record sound. Through their educational portal everything is "housed" in a safe environment and teachers can communicate via video for feedback or assign assignments.

Oncore is a free iPad app that acts as a learning management system for teachers. This simple to use app allows educators to track student behavior as well as assess students in real-time. The way this works is by uses color-coded data, to help educators visualize student's performance and help assess data.

Unique to Oncore is its integration of Common Core and Next Generation Science Standards. Teachers can tie a standard to classroom activities, groups, assignments, or individual participations with students."

I highly recommend checking out Oncore Classroom Productivity app by clicking here!!!*Oncore is an advertiser of Technology Tidbits.

FreshGrade is a wonderful new tool for educators looking to create digital portfolios of their students work. The way this works is through an easy to use mobile app (i.e. parents, students, and teachers) that allows teachers to capture student work through, video, audio, photos, text (notes), etc. Also, FreshGrade easily allows educators to share student's work through a tap of a button, to either the student or parent. Finally, using the web app a user can use FreshGrade to assign activities, assess them in real-time, and even differentiate instruction.

30hands Learning is the excellent company for creating an innovative LMS (Learning Management System) as well as the popular mobile iOS apps that are ideal for digital storytelling (30hands Starter (free), 30hands Pro (paid)). The 30hands community is a perfect cloud based solution that allows educators to: manage/track students, hand in/out assignments, sched
ule events, and more. While the mobile apps are being used in education for project based learning, digital storytelling, and more.

30hands has lots of exciting news on the horizon...

After upgrading to Pro, users will have access to existing advanced features and new features in the works:

• Video clips as slides

• Google Drive + Dropbox Integration

• Importing of Google Slides and PDFs as 30hands slides

• Backgrounds and scenes

• Higher quality videos

• Advanced drag-and-drop drawing with editing (Aug 2015)

• Slide sharing with parents and students (Fall 2015)

• Slide Transitions (Fall 2015)

• Unlimited presentations

• Unlimited saves to Camera Roll

Districts that purchase 30hands Pro will get free or discounted professional development (depending on licenses purchased). The PD can be onsite or virtual and selected from our areas of expertise: Digital Storytelling, PBL, Blended Learning, Teaching Coding, and Teaching Entrepreneurship.

30hands Learning is putting 20% of the net sales of 30hands Pro toward helping kids without hands get a 3D dream hand. Your students can help by printing a hand, assembling a hand, designing a hand, telling a story or buying 30hands Pro.

Tuesday, January 19, 2016

I’ve talked about Quizalize before in this review. Like Kahoot and Quizziz it is a classroom tool to assess and engage students. However, since I’ve last talked about it they have updated the tool significantly and it’s now an even better way to give a great educational experience to your students.

Unlike Quizziz and Kahoot, Quizalize provides in-depth data about your students results, highlighting their individual strengths and weaknesses as well as the performance of the class as a whole. It’s really easy to understand what the class as whole struggled with as well as what individual help to give to each student.

Not only that, Quizalize has introduced the concept of a team game you can project on your class’ whiteboard. When students play in class they are automatically added to one of two teams which compete for points (given for correct answers). This allows the whole class to be engaged while not demoralizing any of your underperforming students. In fact, you can easily spot them and give them the help they need. Students love playing the game again and again to get a better result! The team game is really a fun way for students to be engaged in their own improvement.

Other features that have been added include the ability to turn the timer off, have sounds on student devices as well as being able to randomize question order. There are now many more curated quizzes available on the marketplace and there seem to be more every day.

Quizalize is a great way to provide variety, to engage students and to quickly understand how they are performing.

ClassDojo the widely popular communication and behavioral reinforcement tool for educators, has just released their latest project, Big Ideas for the Classroom.

From their press release...

"Today ClassDojo and Stanford's University Project for Education Research That Scales (PERTS) announced a partnership to help millions of students learn about 'growth mindset' in their classrooms. As part of this partnership, ClassDojo developed a five-part series of animated videos that will be available free to all teachers. It is the first in ClassDojo's "Big Ideas' series, where ClassDojo will bring cutting-edge research into the classroom -- with characters that students know and love.

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Seesaw Blogs is the latest feature from Seesaw that is the great digital portfolio tool that educators are using everywhere. This new feature is a simple way for students to share their work to a global audience in a safe/teacher moderated way. Also, teachers can use "Connected" blogs to collaborate w/ classrooms around the world.

Scholar Quest is a fun free iPad app for Game Based Learning. The way this works is a player moves across a tile board answering questions while trying to find a hidden key to unlock the next level. Questions cover a wide range of topics from History to Sports, books, and more. Also, a player collects coins, power-ups, etc while getting help from Leonardo Da Vinci.

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Storyboard That the widely popular learning tool for education, has just released a major update to their teacher dashboard. This new polished user interface adds a great "Featured Activity" section as well as links to a wide variety of teacher guides. These teacher guides can are customizable and can be easily integrated into any curriculum while still maintaining the drag-n-drop simplicity of Storyboard That. Another excellent feature for teachers is the detailed reporting section that not only tracks student usage but helps teachers facilitate their use of Storyboard That in the classroom.

Storyboard That is an excellent Web 2.0 site/graphic organizer for schools that educators everywhere are using for a wide variety of purposes such as: digital storytelling, writing prompts, project based learning, timelines, and much much more. Also, the educational portal makes it is easy to track and monitor student progress while generating detailed reports.

Monday, January 11, 2016

Unicorn Glitterluck is a fun iOS app for young kids learning how to count 1 to 20. This app uses a side scrolling platform style game to have users guide a customizable unicorn through a number of magical worlds (i.e. Magic Forrest, Cloud Sky, etc.)

I highly recommend checking out Unicorn Glitterluck by clicking here!!!

Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Weo is an excellent new site for mobile learning that reminds me a tad of Pinterest. The way this works is educators create a class and then can manually add students or have them join via a unique "class code" (i.e. ClassDojo), making it ideal for CIPA/COPPA compliance. Once the class is created then educators can then search for assignments and "pin" them to a board similar to the way Pinterest works. Also, they can create their own assignments if they are not finding the ones they want and assign them to a class. Finally, students can then complete their assignments online and educators can get results in assess them in real-time to help differentiate instruction.

Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Math File Folder Games is an excellent company for finding inexpensive or free educational iOS apps for Math. These games are fun to play and high replay value being multi-player via bluetooth which allows players to play the same game on separate devices. Also, MFFG games have interactive "whiteboards" to work out problems, scoring that can be emailed to parents/teachers, and more.

5 Dice: Order of Operations Game

4 Dice: Fraction Games

(Cost: $1.99)4 Dice: Fraction Games is a math app for middle school and upper elementary students. The goal of the game is to present fractions in a way that is both conducive to learning and fun. Read More Here

Ordered Fractions: Comparing & Ordering Fractions

(Cost: $1.99)

Ordered Fractionsgame begins by pressing the button that rolls the dice. Students then insert these numbers into the boxes on the board, which creates the fractions. Students then position the fractions in ascending order by comparing fractions. Read more here

Grid Lines: Ordered Pair Game

(Cost: $1.99)

Grid Lines is a Battleship-style math app used to teach students the coordinate plane. Students will get practice plotting points on a coordinate plane by playing a game similar to Battleship. Read more here

Tangram Chess: Transformation Games

(Cost: $1.99)

Tangram Chess For Kids, Translations (slides), Rotations (turns) and Reflections (flips). Every game of Tangram Chess has its own story. Some are long-drawn out strategic affairs; others can be quick, but complicated, tactical battles. The winner is the player who can out-think his or her opponent, and make the best plans for attack and defence. Read more here

Skip Math: Skip Counting Games

(Cost: $0.99)Skip Math is a simple math game that helps practices skip counting. Skip Math is a a Doodle Jump style math game in which a girl or boy who jump from platform to platform counting by a certain number. Read more here

Jack and the Beanstalk a Mathematical Adventure

Hi, my name is Jack. I know you have all heard of me before, I'm the guy who climbs an enormous beanstalk to retrieve the princesses amulet. But today I would like to tell you the real story of HOW I was actually able to accomplish such a feat. Read more here

As a new year begins, a new slate of adventures lie ahead in 2016. To celebrate, PBS LearningMedia has released its PBS World Explorer video collection, which tells the tales of world-famous explorers- both from centuries ago, and modern times.
Most under 5-minutes long, the videos provide “on-the-go” students,
and adults, with a convenient way to watch and learn in mini “cram
sessions.” Each video includes fun animations and engaging music to
capture the viewer’s interest, in a visually appealing and entertaining
way.
To help bring these videos to life, we’ve included below a few angles that may appeal to your readers:

How to get your kids interested in history

For kids who have short attention spans, these short videos are the
perfect “cram sessions.” Fun animations and music are used to capture
the interest of kids and tell the stories of the explorers in a visually
appealing way.

Are you smarter than a 5th grader?

Adults can test their “explorer knowledge” to see if they still remember what they learned back in grade school.

What did explorers do before Google Maps?

Emphasize the awe-inspiring adventures and explorations of these
world-famous explorers, before society was dependent on iPhones and
Google Maps.

Holidays and birthdays

These explorers provided countless milestone events including
holidays, birthdays, and anniversaries. The World Explorer videos
highlight why these holidays are celebrated.

Some examples of famous explorers who are featured include: Ponce de
Leon, Amerigo Vespucci, Neil Armstrong, Marco Polo, and more. You can
check out the PBS World Explorer online here.

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David Kapuler

I have been working w/ technology and education for over 14 years in a school setting. I'm looking for work in a K-12 environment as a Technology Integration/Support Specialist in WI/IL. Contact email - dkapuler@gmail.com
I'm currently looking to get my Mac OS/Repair Certification, as well as a Masters in Technology Integration.
Also, I have a solid background in web design, w/ network/server support.
On a personal note, I';m a proud father of 3 boys and 1 girl, and have been married for 10 years.